The Reflection In The Mirror

Remy turned away from the mirror he couldn’t see. He wasn’t a vain man, exactly, but he’d had a supreme confidence in himself that was in part based on the admiring looks he was used to getting. From women who saw the excitement and danger hidden not too far below the surface. From men who envied his smooth charm. The long walk from the doctor’s office home showed him exactly what his life would now be like. People who had formerly respected his silence, but would usually nod to him did their best not to stare. Mothers pulled children out of his way. A pretty girl looked, shivered and drew back. An old man gazed at him with pity. And he didn’t even have the comfort of not knowing it. Between his spatial awareness and his empathy, being blind almost didn’t matter.

He tried to pull himself out of this unwelcome vulnerability to what others thought about him. **Beast got t’rough looking diff’rent and didn’t lose his cool. Fact is, you admired dat. Yeah, I jus’ be like Henri.** He tried to feel his way into Henry’s perpetual good humor. **Just another costume, neh?** It chafed in places, and rubbed him raw in others as he tried to be pleasant to someone he could feel shrinking away from him. He realized Henry’s way was never going to work for him as he made his way back to his cabin. He stopped in the entryway and turned to face the mirror he knew was there. Slowly he raised his hand and felt the smooth, cool surface. **Guess it work for Henri because he got not’ing to hide. Me... I got t’ings buried dat make ‘Pocalypse look at me like I was dirt.**

**May as well be dirt. Rogue ain’t never gonna be come back. Leas’ not to me. Yeah, dere was a chance I could ‘a talked her ‘round sooner or later. ‘Til Seattle, she ...liked...me. Never could get more outta her dan dat. She respond to me partly ‘cause of how I looked. Can’ fault dat.**

**Rogue don’ be dat shallow. She won’ care ‘bout how I look now.** Optimistic voices that ran through his head, and wouldn’t be silenced. His shattered face twisted into a new pattern of scars. **Yeah. Guess dat be true. ‘Cept Rogue don’ like what was inside before de outside got so messed up. And de inside is what got to count now.** Rogue couldn’t face up to what, no, who he was. He knew what she’d seen in his head that day. Some half-unconscious mental misdirection had kept her away from the worst, but what she’d gotten had sent her running as far away from him as she could get. **What you got to tempt her wit’ now, homme?** A bitter question, and his heart redoubled it’s lonely

Remy had nowhere to go, and nowhere he wanted to be. He’d left the X-men. He saw Rogue around every corner, felt her imprint on every room he was in, and he couldn’t deal with it. His mind seemed to be in a permanent replay of that moment in Seattle, when he’d stretched out his hand to her, and dared to put his future on the line. Rogue had turned away. Maybe someone else could have considered it a temporary setback. But not an empath. His heart had been wide open to Rogue, begging her to see past what he was, to see what he was trying to be, for her. Begging for her to give him the most precious gifts he knew; trust, understanding, someone to believe in him. Rogue wouldn’t or couldn’t. He knew she ran when things got tough, but he’d needed her to try. Instead, she’d left again. **Didn’ look like she even hesitated, mon ami.** He couldn’t lie to himself. Rogue had wanted nothing to do with him, or his ugly past. He’d begun to feel like nothing more than a reflection in a mirror. He remembered Siku’s favorite story, "The Velveteen Rabbit", and how the little rabbit had ached to be real, and loved. If nobody loved you, did that mean you could never be real?

Remy knew he couldn’t stay in the mansion any longer. He’d thought long and hard about leaving the team altogether, but they’d sort of become like family to the heartlonely Gambit. But his "family" was giving him the silent treatment. Their not talking to him was bad enough. Their silent looks of accusation were killing him. Like he’d deliberately revealed his past to Rogue, just to drive her away from what was her family too. Her family first. He wasn’t imagining it, he could feel it. So, to save what was left of his sanity, he’d known he’d have to go.

Noble wasn’t something Remy did well, but for Rogue, he’d tried. He’d wanted to find Rogue and talk to her before he left, to say he was trying to understand, and tell her…nothing she wanted to hear. Remy sighed, and realized the best he was capable of where Rogue was concerned was to leave her be.

Remy had made it a point to never explain the why’s of his life, but he’d wanted to try this time. He’d tried to find a way to explain to Cyclops that his heart couldn’t believe in dreams anymore. He’d wanted to belong to Rogue; that was his dream. The only one he could ever remember allowing himself to have, and it was shattered beyond his ability to comprehend. With no dream of his own, he couldn’t find a reason or the desire to follow someone else’s. But Rogue was gone, and Cyclops wouldn’t see past the fact that in his opinion, Gambit’s leaving was quitting, pure and simple. Scott’s unspoken condemnation piled onto Gambit’s already heavy load of self-hatred, and the weight bent shoulders that had never shown shame. Sadness dulled the shine that Gambit’s personality had sparkled with. Despair clogged his voice with melted wishes.

Remy had never denied his empathy to himself. To him it was just another weapon in his arsenal. but his unhappiness had dissolved his usual control of his gift, and the emotional buffeting he was taking from his teammates was having miserable consequences. He’d known Scott didn’t think much of him. Usually, the feeling was mutual. But being a part of the X-Men had meant something to him, whether the others had understood that or not. It meant he could redeem his soul bit by bit. He could escape his past, and start over with a new family. And he’d thought they’d begun to believe in him. He’d thought they understood that this time he wasn’t just out for himself. From Scott’s emotions at this point though, it was clear that he’d been waiting and hoping for the time Gambit would give up and go away. And Scott was glad about it. Remy tried to reach for some understanding of Scott Summers. **Maybe Scott jus’ see what still below de surface, and don’ believe I can be better dan I used to. Can’ blame de guy for dat.** But his heart called him a liar.

Remy tried to say goodbye to the others. Logan growled and stalked away before he got a word out. Storm was off on a mission, and couldn’t be reached. Jean looked at him like she’d like to run his mind through a cuisenart to find what Rogue has seen that made her leave her adoptive family. Bobby sneered. "Bout time you figured out you don’t belong here."

The only person he’d managed to get a semi-civilized response from was Beast. But even with Henry, there was a reserve to his manner. **Henry, he don’ wan’ to know why I be leaving. He don’ wan’’ to feel he got to help. He jus’ wan’ t’ings to get back to what passes for normal ‘roun here.**

Gambit’s control was fracturing. He needed someone to understand, but didn’t know how to reach out to anyone, or make them believe him. His smooth talk and easy patter weren’t much good when Gambit needed someone to really understand. Stormy might have. But Storm wasn’t there when Remy finally figured out that if he stayed, his presence and Rogue’s absence would cause damage to the team that would never be fixable. If he stayed, well...he’d probably be dead in a year.

Remy couldn’t recognize himself anymore. Not so much the outside, but the far greater changes inside. His time with the X-men had shown him that his automatic defenses against letting people get too close weren’t always needed. He felt betrayed when he realized how their reactions to his leaving contradicted what they preached.

These days, when he needed his armor most, when he needed to not care what people thought of him, it felt like what was once a reflex was beyond his grasp. Every thought of everyone around him was like looking into a mirror, only it wasn’t just a reflection they gave back. Their shock, disgust, fear, and horror passed into his soul. His battered heart was shown again and again that the ugliness inside was finally reflected on the outside.

**Homme, you sure screwed your life up. Here you be, needing to reach out to someone, and just now realizing you ain’t got no one.** He studied the Rogue sized hole in himself. **Ain’t nobody gonna fit it.** He ran his scarred and twisted fingers over his face. **Hell, homme...ain’t nobody gonna want it.**

He’d wandered for a long while after he left the X-Men. He’d stopped briefly in New Orleans, but home didn’t feel like home anymore. He moved to New York, and the crowds he used to fit into like a second skin, but the splintered emotions, and broken heart in him cried for solitude. He passed over the northwest. Finally he stopped in Canada. Here was solitude. Deep in the woods, no one’s emotions all but assaulted him when he walked by. He could be as alone as he needed to be. He bought a small cabin about ten miles out of a small town that he visited only when imminent starvation made him. Remy wasn’t intentionally brooding, but not being around others made him more and more aware of how alone he was, and he avoided thinking about the past when he could. The one exception was thoughts of Rogue. He couldn’t remove her image from inside him with two quarts of morphine and a scalpel.

It was the not thinking that started it. Remy couldn’t stop being aware of everything in his vicinity. What he could do was not pay attention to the warning his ability was giving him. He was on his monthly trip to town, and wrapped up in thoughts of Rogue too deep to be shaken out of lightly.

Trying to figure a way to be someone Rogue wanted to know again, he ignored the ball that rolled down the sidewalk. Saw it when he tripped over it, of course. Saw it real up close and personal when he fell off the curb into the street and the ball skipped past his nose. **Dieu.** His nose. **Ouch. Homme, t’ink you gonna have to have de local doc take a look at dat. Don’ t’ink its s’posed to bend dat way.** Pounding footsteps warned him of an approach.

"Sorry mister. Gotta catch my ball. Be back inna minute." He watched the child dash after the ball. The kid had red hair, which started him back on thoughts of Rogue. Remy rolled to his feet without his usual grace. He touched his nose gingerly. **Damn.** He sighed. **Guess dis Cajun boy gonna be spendin’ more time in town dan he wanted.**

He heard the raspy squeal of sliding tires, heard the scream of metal twisting around metal, heard the soft thud of flesh meeting metal, and then the screams. It was the screams that jarred him into movement. Seems he still needed to feel like he made a difference after all.

He ran to where a car had wrapped itself around a lamppost in an effort to avoid the child chasing his ball. It failed. He saw the child crumpled against the curb, but a couple of people nearby were doing what could be done to help him. He looked at the car, and time slowed down as he went into what he’d always thought of as "battle mode".

Driver; not moving; no passenger. Car wrapped around the pole right behind the driver side door. **Not gonna get him out dat way, homme.** Time slowed further for the Cajun as he assessed possibles and probables. He tried the passenger side door. It moved, but wouldn’t open. **Gonna have to blow de door.** He sent a low charge into the edge of the door, trying to make the jamb release without exploding the entire door, and injuring the driver further.

That’s when everything blew up in his face. Literally. Remy kept thinking he should have seen the leaking gas. He’d been subconsciously counting on the smell to warn him, but his nose wasn’t in any shape to help. The charge he’d sent into the door caused the door to release, all right, but also sparked the gas pooling around his feet.

If you looked at it from the doc’s point of view, he was incredibly lucky. EMS personnel were pulling onto the scene when he pulled his imitation of the Torch. Somebody got to him in seconds with a blanket they used to smother the flames. He’d been wearing his usual leather duster, and his boots, and so hardly had any burns where he was protected by his coat, but his face and hands, well, like the doc said, at least he still had partial use of the left hand. His one noticeable mutant feature, his eyes, were both more and less noticeable. In effect, however, useless. His right hand had been burned clear to the bone, and made a great paperweight these days.

An alpha class mutant, who may as well be Homo sapien. **Can still charge de cards…jus’ gonna get stuck wit ‘em cause I can’ t’row dem no more.** The irony of it struck him. **Hell, homme, what one more explosion gonna do to me, eh?** A twist of the lips that would once have been a sardonic grin.

Remy’s legendary agility was gone. His catlike walk was still there, but was shadowed by the ruin of his face and the awkward way his arms were held. Since getting out of the hospital, he kept his hands hidden in his pockets whenever possible. He’d thrown out his fingerless gloves and bought a pair of leather driving gloves. Wearing them became second nature. The sunglasses weren’t a big adjustment. He’d worn them most all the time anyway.

Remy knew he’d have to think about what he was going to do next. The accident had occurred six months ago. The hospital and plastic surgeons had done what they could, but they couldn’t make him what he was. The first month he couldn’t remember anything but pain. He’d wake screaming, and wouldn’t be able to stop. Remy knew about pain. He’d been injured before, but the loss of control regarding his empathy that he’d first started to experience just before he’d left the X-Men had now extended to other areas. He couldn’t shut the pain away, or use it as a spur to keep going. It just was, and it seemed never ending.

Remy fell backwards onto the sofa in the living room, awkwardly holding his hands against his chest. **T’ink dat second mont’ be worse dan de first in some ways.** The first month’s constant pain had helped suppress his empathy to some degree. After that, he’d tried, with only partial success, to relearn control of his gifts. He’d woken up one morning whimpering like a frightened child after a nightmare. An unspoken cry for Rogue was echoing through him. He wanted Rogue. Something in Remy broke, then. Remy hadn’t cried in public since he was two. Now the tears were absent from his useless eyes, but the sobs of a grown man who simply couldn’t take anymore pain had the nurses who’d come running to his door shedding them for him. He’d tried so hard to be better than the man he once was. **When can I leave de dirt behind, and deserve more?** The overwhelming sobbing brought on by too much mental and physical torment had broken free from his frayed control and wouldn’t stop for three weeks. The docs had a field day trying new anti-depressant medications on him. Problem is, when breathing in and out reminds you that you don’t have a reason to breathe in and out anymore, it’s real hard to feel happy. **Don’ feel bad, homme, weren’t the first time you cried over her. Prob’ly won’ be de last, neither.**

Back at the mansion, Jean was once again staring into space. Finally, after watching her stare at the walls for a week, Scott gave in and asked what was wrong.

"I think we

"About what?" asked Scott, trying to understand.

"Remy."

"I see. Just what has Rogue said to you since she got back?"

"Scott, she just got back a two days ago, and has been either in her room, or on the roof for forty hours of it. I haven’t had a chance to say anything to her other that welcome home, and you know it."

"Okay. But something has been bugging you for the last week. I’d assumed you had a good reason to be distracted, but if it’s just Gambit, I’d say it’s your business."

Jean put her hand on Scott’s arm as he started to turn away.

"No Scott, I mean it. I think we were wrong."

Scott sighed, and reached for his patience. There was precious little left where Gambit was concerned. "And just how, pray tell, were we wrong? Did we forget to send him a Christmas card? Gee, I’m sorry Gambit. Guess Santa couldn’t find a pit deep enough to bury you in. Wish you were here, I’d turn you over to Logan, and he’d do it personally."

Jean looked at him, and her disappointment in him showed in her mental withdrawal.

Rogue sat on the roof, looking at the sunset. Her life didn’t seem to be making much sense to her lately, and she needed to find a direction, a goal to head toward.

She’d heard that Remy had left the X-Men several months ago, and she couldn’t understand what she was feeling. Relieved that she wouldn’t have to deal with him, certainly. But what else? Did she still l-like him? She’d seen the look in his eyes when she turned away from him in Seattle. Those enigmatic eyes of his that were usually faintly calculating and mostly flirtatious had personified the word pain. And she’d caused it. Both then and right now, Rogue didn’t like herself very much for that.

She tried to justify what she’d done to Remy by remembering what she’d seen in that murky maze he called his mind. But for every act of thoughtlessness, there was a kindness that was just as unthinking. For every murder committed, a battered child would live in peace. For every theft, there was an anonymous gift.

That was the heart of her problem. She was scared of Gambit. She’d seen what he’d done, and seen the lack of caring that accompanied it. She’d seen him turn on the charm when he wanted something, and turn it off when he had it. **Was Ah just somethin’ he wanted?** she wondered.

**That dog won’t hunt,** she was forced to concede. **Remy done coulda had me most anytime, but he only pushed ‘til he knew Ah’da pushed back if’n he’d gone any further.**

She remembered the way Remy had gone out of his way to make sure Rogue knew he cared about her, their first date, even that dadblamed kiss. Rogue finally acknowledged that Remy really honestly and truly loved her.

But did Rogue love Remy? Danged if’n she knew. **What does love feel like from the inside out?** Rogue had learned early on that people who are lonely build walls around their hearts, instead of bridges. She also knew that Remy had to be one of the loneliest people she’d ever met, not that any of the other X-Men would agree with her. Where did Remy get the courage to reach out to her? What made Remy decide that she was the one he wanted? Her looks? With that danged skunk striped hair, not hardly. The southern belle act? Might have started the attraction, but Remy knew she weren’t no sweet, shy Miss Muffett.

**Maybe there ain’t no reason. Maybe there’s some truth to the rumor that ever’body has a soul mate. Could I be Remy’s other half, without him bein’ mine? That don’t rightly seem fair.**

Confusion settled in a heavy cloud around Rogue. She built a picture of Gambit in her mind. As she looked at it, she felt like smacking herself once for being stupid, and twice for being really stupid. It wasn’t Remy she was scared of; it was Gambit! And from the first moment they’d met, when Storm had introduced him to the team as her friend, Gambit, he’d walked straight over to where she sat, and said "No, chere, to you I always be Remy."

Remy had done gone and told her who he was, time and time again, and still she didn’t see it. His refusal to discuss his past went hand in hand with his identity. To the others, he was the mysterious Cajun Gambit, whose secrets were his to keep, as long as they didn’t cause the team problems. To Rogue, those secrets belonged to someone else, not her Remy. **It weren’t like Remy was some Mafia boss, or nothin’, who didn’t want his girl involved in his business, her Remy just weren’t that person no more.**

**I gotta go tell him. ** That conclusion reached, Rogue headed for Jean.

"Jean? Where’d Remy go when he left?" Rogue looked somewhere past Jean’s left shoulder as she asked. "I gotta tell him somthin’. "

Jean looked at Rogue, taking in the troubled eyes, and tension brackets around her mouth. "I don’t know, Rogue."